The present invention relates generally to lasers and more specifically to dye lasers.
Dye lasers typically use a dye dissolved in a liquid solvent and are pumped by ion lasers such as argon lasers, which suffer the disadvantage of low efficiency. Also, laser dyes in pure or liquid solution form are generally carcinogenic, and the solvents used with laser dyes are often flammable as well as carcinogenic and their disposal presents a toxic waste problem.
A solid state dye laser host is described by Kessler et al. in U.S. Pat. No. 5,610,932 issued on Mar. 11, 1997. In Kessler, a polyacrylamide host is doped with a laser dye and encapsulated within a solid container. The container is placed between two feedback mirrors and is pumped by a Nd:YAG laser. A disadvantage of this arrangement is its inherently low optical efficiency.
A monolithic switched microlaser is described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,832,010 issued on Nov. 3, 1998 to Fulbert et al. This monolithic structure of this device limits the extent of its applications.
A compact solid state dye laser of the present invention comprises a solid state laser gain element for generating laser pump energy, a passive Q-switch for generating high intensity bursts of laser pump energy, a frequency doubler for generating dye laser pump energy, and a solid state laser dye element for generating optical energy output.
An advantage of the compact solid state dye laser of the present invention is a higher conversion efficiency may be obtained than that of conventional dye lasers.
Another advantage is that the present invention may be implemented in an all solid state, monolithic, tunable dye laser in a field-portable, compact, battery powered structure.
Still another advantage is that the laser dye may be embedded in an inert matrix that protects the user and the environment from toxic exposure.
Yet another advantage is that the dye laser of the present invention may be modulated at high repetition rates.
Another advantage is that the dye laser of the present invention has low sensitivity to alignment sensitivities.